Project Spark - Xbox Onehttps://www.gameinformer.com/games/project_spark/b/xboxone/default.aspxen-USTelligent Community 1.5.134.12297 (Build: 5.5.134.12297)Build An Estimation Of Your Dream Gamehttps://www.gameinformer.com/games/project_spark/b/xboxone/archive/2014/10/17/game-informer-project-spark-review.aspxFri, 17 Oct 2014 18:54:47 GMT79ef0c18-1c65-4225-984f-fdaeab0f0862:7024202Kyle Hilliard0<p><img src="http://media1.gameinformer.com/filestorage/CommunityServer.Components.SiteFiles/imagefeed/featured/microsoft2014/projectspark/wor/PROJECTPARKREVIEW_610.jpg" style="max-width:610px;" border="0" alt="" /></p>
<p>Despite a long-standing adoration for the medium of video games, I have never been interested in trying to make my own. Even with that mindset, however, Project Spark quickly got my creative juices flowing in an enjoyable way.</p>
<p>When creating a game and world of your own, the first thing Project Spark has you do is terraform the land. Building mountains and tearing holes in the ground is fast and quickly gives you a sense you are creating something worth exploring. That&rsquo;s the easy part. From there, you are dropped into the daunting task of coding (or Koding as it is referred to in Project Spark) your world and characters.</p>
<p>A short single-player game helps explain some of the properties of the coding, but it feels unfinished. Essentially, players must find coding tiles to complete logic sentences that manipulate the level to their will. This is a great way to showcase how coding works in a fun way, and could have been a great way to foster ideas for players to create their own games (something LittleBigPlanet&rsquo;s campaigns do expertly), but its lack of content make it feel like a teaching opportunity falling short of its goals. The handful of short episodes is completed in very little time, but Microsoft promises more episodes in the future.</p>
<p>The coding system in general offers a clean and fairly straightforward visual approximation of a typical programming language, but once you start moving outside of the starter templates, it can get confusing fast. Everything is arranged into &ldquo;when&rdquo; and &ldquo;do&rdquo; logic sentences. For example, you can manipulate the brain of your playable character so &ldquo;when&rdquo; the A button is pressed, the player will &ldquo;do&rdquo; the jump action. You can add modifiers from there, opening up an intimidating rabbit hole where seemingly simple actions become head-scratching puzzles. I was forced to access the Internet on many occasions to figure things out. Getting your coding to work and having the game to do exactly what you want it to do, however, is rewarding.</p>
<p>(Please visit the site to view this media)</p>
<p>Outside of the campaign, which disguises its educational value, there is only one tutorial for making a straightforward 3D action/platforming game. This is the type of game Project Spark favors, even though making many different types of games is possible. For a game so proud of its malleability, I was surprised it didn&rsquo;t make a stronger effort to teach you more of its options.</p>
<p>Project Spark may come up short in helping the player understand how best to take advantage of it, but there is a vibrant community of players making genuinely fun games (and non-games) that have been working hard with Spark since before the game officially launched. I played first-person shooters, turn-based RPGs, music simulators, weird experiments, and more. It&rsquo;s easy to search and see if anybody has tried to make something specific, but Project Spark also surfaces the good stuff well. From nearly any menu, a list of recent suggestions appears, which means if you see something that looks interesting, trying it out or downloading it to look at the level&rsquo;s code and remix it is simple. This gives players a lot of incentive to keep checking in and see what people are making, so even if you don&rsquo;t want to try your hand at design, you may find some entertaining content.</p>
<p>Project Spark offers an impressive collection of tools for tinkerers, or even someone who might want to try prototyping an idea, but the experience is what you&rsquo;re willing to make of it. It won&rsquo;t make a designer out of everyone, but if you&rsquo;re eager to invest and study, it can be a versatile and enjoyable tool.</p><div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="https://www.gameinformer.com/aggbug.aspx?PostID=7024202" width="1" height="1">project sparkActionXbox OnerebuilddestroyReviewcreatescoregi260Linkin Park's New Music Video Created In Project Sparkhttps://www.gameinformer.com/games/project_spark/b/xboxone/archive/2014/03/25/guilty-all-the-same-music-video-project-spark.aspxTue, 25 Mar 2014 14:09:00 GMT79ef0c18-1c65-4225-984f-fdaeab0f0862:6705225Isaac Federspiel64https://www.gameinformer.com/games/project_spark/b/xboxone/rsscomments.aspx?WeblogPostID=6705225https://www.gameinformer.com/games/project_spark/b/xboxone/archive/2014/03/25/guilty-all-the-same-music-video-project-spark.aspx#comments<p><img src="http://media1.gameinformer.com/filestorage/CommunityServer.Components.SiteFiles/imagefeed/featured/microsoft2014/projectspark/projectsparkLP610.jpg" border="0" style="max-width:610px;" alt="" /></p>
<p>Team Dakota&rsquo;s Project Spark is a tool for those interested in game design, or just wanting to mess around in a creative space. Apparently, it can also be used to create a music video, as demonstrated by this collaboration with Linkin Park.</p>
<p>(Please visit the site to view this media)</p>
<p>The music video for &quot;Guilty all the Same&quot; was created entirely in Project Spark, and can be played or altered by users. A <a target="_blank" href="http://majornelson.com/2014/03/25/project-spark-linkin-park/">blog post</a> by Larry Hryb (a.k.a. Major Nelson) says that people can create &ldquo;a new music video, music game, or whatever else you&rsquo;d like.&rdquo;</p>
<p>The Project Spark beta was <a href="http://www.gameinformer.com/games/project_spark/b/xboxone/archive/2014/03/04/hands-on-with-project-spark_2c00_-xbox-one-beta-live-today.aspx">opened up to everyone with an Xbox One</a> last week, but the PC version is still in closed beta. The full release is expected later this year, but no specific date has been announced.&nbsp;</p>
<div></div><div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="https://www.gameinformer.com/aggbug.aspx?PostID=6705225" width="1" height="1">team dakotaproject sparkPreviewActionXbox OneMicrosoftlarry hrybmusic videoguilty all the samelinkin parkmajor nelsonHands On With Project Spark, Xbox One Beta Live Todayhttps://www.gameinformer.com/games/project_spark/b/xboxone/archive/2014/03/04/hands-on-with-project-spark_2C00_-xbox-one-beta-live-today.aspxTue, 04 Mar 2014 08:00:00 GMT79ef0c18-1c65-4225-984f-fdaeab0f0862:6621028Mike Futter26https://www.gameinformer.com/games/project_spark/b/xboxone/rsscomments.aspx?WeblogPostID=6621028https://www.gameinformer.com/games/project_spark/b/xboxone/archive/2014/03/04/hands-on-with-project-spark_2C00_-xbox-one-beta-live-today.aspx#comments<p><img style="max-width:610px;" border="0" src="http://media1.gameinformer.com/filestorage/CommunityServer.Components.SiteFiles/imagefeed/featured/microsoft2014/projectspark/ProjSparkZombie-610.jpg" alt="" /></p>
<p>Last week, we got hands-on time with Team Dakota&rsquo;s world-building platform Project Spark. Not only did we experience some of the creations that people have been building in the PC beta, but we saw the Xbox One version in action.</p>
<p>After a short video featuring many community creations, executive producer Saxs Persson and designer Claude Jerome took us through some of what players have been building since the beta began in December 2013. To date, there are 55,000 beta participants with over 6,000 creations available on the service.</p>
<p>These include game prototypes like a pinball table made of logs, a long stovepipe plunger, and various other pieces of the fantasy tool kit. We also played a devilishly difficult Super Meat Boy style platformer called Blaze Jumper, requiring precise wall jumps and countless deaths on spikes.</p>
<p>There are also concept pieces like Colour. This artistic experience takes players across a watercolor landscape just to see the sights. As you might expect when players get their hands on a toolkit like Project Spark, there are also homages and recreations.</p>
<p><img style="max-width:610px;" border="0" src="http://media1.gameinformer.com/filestorage/CommunityServer.Components.SiteFiles/imagefeed/featured/microsoft2014/projectspark/Project_Spark_Festival_DLC_01.jpg" alt="" /></p>
<p>Game of Thrones fans can walk through a replica of King&rsquo;s Landing. Fable fans can relive the opening moments of the original title&rsquo;s Oakvale childhood sequence, complete with quests and dialog. There are action RPGs with steampunk flare and even an Asteroids clone with an option to enable the traditional vector graphics.&nbsp;</p>
<p>When Project Spark&rsquo;s Xbox One beta goes live today, all of these creations will be available for players to download. You can also provide feedback, leave comments, follow creators, and mark your favorite levels for a quick return.&nbsp;</p>
<p>Project Spark makes use of the Xbox One&rsquo;s Internet Explorer app, and you can move back and forth between the two easily, including launching creations from the website. Persson and Jerome tell us that creations are often handed off from player to player.&nbsp;</p>
<p>For instance, one person might take a town square as far as he/she wants. Others can download it, remix it, and make their enhanced version available. Users are starting to specialize in different type of creations, further enhancing Project Spark&rsquo;s utility as a toolkit.</p>
<p><img style="max-width:610px;" border="0" src="http://media1.gameinformer.com/filestorage/CommunityServer.Components.SiteFiles/imagefeed/featured/microsoft2014/projectspark/Project_Spark_CM_Sculpt_01.jpg" alt="" /></p>
<p>One thing that hasn&rsquo;t been possible before the Xbox One beta are custom animations and voice overs. Using the Kinect camera, players can add personality to characters. As an example, Jerome loaded up a dance party and selected a character template for me.&nbsp;</p>
<p>As terrible a dancer as I am, the Kinect picked up subtle movements like a jutted hip, raised eyebrows, and open mouth. Where the original Kinect would get confused as hands passed over one another, the new camera was able to mimic my pathetic disco moves perfectly.</p>
<p>Animations can then be edited for optimal looping, and different movements can be tasked to different controller buttons. Persson and Jerome also showed the value of props. For instance, the Kinect won&rsquo;t pick up a chair, so sitting on one and moving can easily be made to look like falling as the model appears to be floating.</p>
<p>The duo also shared some tricks. For instance, attaching props to a human skeletal form can be used to create monsters. Recording sound effects from a phone, for instance, through the Kinect can help create roars, gurgles, and unearthly screams. Project Spark makes a better case for Kinect as a gaming device than most of what has been released for either version of the peripheral.</p>
<p>Just as people are creating gameplay and environments, the Xbox One beta will give a crop of character creators a chance to more fully develop elements for others to use. Nothing will be wiped, so all of the creations in progress now will be available in perpetuity.</p>
<p>Project Spark will be free to play, with the fantasy toolset part of the initial download. Other kits, including the deserts, castles, snowy terrain, and more are available for purchase now. These building sets run between $1.50 and $10. The team likens these to digital LEGO sets.&nbsp;</p>
<p>There is also an in-game currency that is earned through building and playing. It&rsquo;s possible to acquire all of the themes just by playing. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s like LEGO, but with frequent flier miles,&rdquo; Persson tells us.</p>
<p>Team Dakota expects to quickly ramp up participants from 55,000 to 1 million. If you haven&rsquo;t yet received a beta invitation, chances are there will be more opportunities soon as the population grows twenty-fold.&nbsp;</p>
<p>Project Spark does not have a narrowed release window yet, but you can expect it some time this year. Since there&rsquo;s no NDA and Twitch support is coming to Xbox One soon, even if you don&rsquo;t get in the beta, expect to see more soon.</p><div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="https://www.gameinformer.com/aggbug.aspx?PostID=6621028" width="1" height="1">team dakotaproject sparkPreviewActionXbox OneClaude JeromeSaxs PerssonMicrosoftMicrosoft Demonstrates The Tools Of Project Sparkhttps://www.gameinformer.com/games/project_spark/b/xboxone/archive/2013/11/06/project-spark-wizard-world.aspxWed, 06 Nov 2013 11:00:00 GMT79ef0c18-1c65-4225-984f-fdaeab0f0862:6288816Dan Ryckert34https://www.gameinformer.com/games/project_spark/b/xboxone/rsscomments.aspx?WeblogPostID=6288816https://www.gameinformer.com/games/project_spark/b/xboxone/archive/2013/11/06/project-spark-wizard-world.aspx#comments<p><img src="http://media1.gameinformer.com/filestorage/CommunityServer.Components.SiteFiles/imagefeed/featured/microsoft2013/xboxone/gamespreview/spark610.jpg" border="0" style="max-width:610px;" alt="" /></p>
<p>When Microsoft demonstrated Project Spark at E3 this year, they had a matter of minutes to show off one of the more complex creation tools seen in console gaming. I recently had a chance to see a more extensive demo of the game&rsquo;s World Wizard creation mode, and came away impressed with the wide array of customization available.</p>
<p>Developer Team Dakota was reluctant to make any mention of a built-in story mode of any sort, but the tools I saw in the demo should guarantee some unique gameplay experiences made by Xbox One gamers. Comparisons to LittleBigPlanet are inevitable with such a community-focused game, but Project Spark may offer gamers even more freedom when it comes to making their own vision come to life.</p>
<p>Upon opening the World Wizard, you can assign a blanket genre to your creation. The three I saw were first-person shooter, third-person brawler, and isometric brawler, although the X button will shuffle and reveal other options. After customizing your player character&rsquo;s appearance, the option to alter the game world itself opens up. A simple sculpt tool makes it possible to add mountains and hills, or switch to erode mode if you want to create valleys and craters. Modification tools make it easy to paint different terrain over the land if you want a snowy or grassy look for your game.</p>
<p>(Please visit the site to view this media)<br /><i>Above: See the game in action at Gamescom</i>&nbsp;</p>
<p>Once you&rsquo;ve modified the world itself, you can start populating it by switching over to the prop menu. Here, you can start placing a variety of allies and enemies, and each of their AI programs can be modified extensively using the brain gallery. Default brains are available if you want generic behavior patterns, but almost any aspect can be tailored to your liking. If you want to create a healer type enemy, you can select the exact health bar percentage his allies have to reach before he automatically begins healing his fellow soldiers.</p>
<p>Modifying your own character&rsquo;s abilities is simple as well, and the tools allow for some crazy skills. I watched as a Team Dakota developer used Kinect to record his own body performing a Street Fighter-like fireball motion, and then applied it to a new skill that he created. This skill involved hitting the LB button to automatically turn enemies&rsquo; brains into those of birds. With the press of LB, the player character performed the recorded motion and several goblin-like enemies suddenly took off into the sky.</p>
<p>Even with an extended demo of Project Spark, I feel that there will be a ton that gamers need to learn in order to get the most out of these extensive tools. The interface seems as user-friendly as possible considering how deep the creation mode gets, so I&rsquo;m hoping that players can start making their own worlds without having to go through hours of tutorials. They&rsquo;ll be able to get a head start on this mode when the beta launches on Xbox One in early 2014.</p><div style="clear:both;"></div><img src="https://www.gameinformer.com/aggbug.aspx?PostID=6288816" width="1" height="1">project sparkPreviewActionXbox OnecreationLive Stream Reveals Details On Empty World Mode https://www.gameinformer.com/games/project_spark/b/xboxone/archive/2013/08/09/project-spark-developers_2700_-live-stream-gives-a-glimpse-into-its-potential.aspxFri, 09 Aug 2013 17:23:00 GMT79ef0c18-1c65-4225-984f-fdaeab0f0862:3805160LizLanier42https://www.gameinformer.com/games/project_spark/b/xboxone/rsscomments.aspx?WeblogPostID=3805160https://www.gameinformer.com/games/project_spark/b/xboxone/archive/2013/08/09/project-spark-developers_2700_-live-stream-gives-a-glimpse-into-its-potential.aspx#comments<div class="paginated-post" rel="2"><div class="paginated-post-page" rel="1"><p><img style="max-width:610px;" border="0" src="http://media1.gameinformer.com/imagefeed/featured/microsoft2013/projectspark/PROJSPARKLOOK610.jpg" alt="" /></p>
<p><a href="http://www.gameinformer.com/b/news/archive/2013/08/08/project-spark-creators-giving-live-demo-on-twitch-today.aspx">As promised</a>, Microsoft aired a 41 minute live demo in which developers gave fans a first-hand look at the upcoming Project Spark. The live stream not only offers a stronger grasp on the concept of Project Spark, but also shows the ease of creating entirely new worlds within its user interface.&nbsp;<span style="font-size:12px;"></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size:12px;"></span><strong>Update</strong>: We have added a clarification regarding the differences between crossroads mode and the level shown in the latter part of the live stream.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:12px;"><img style="max-width:610px;" border="0" src="http://media1.gameinformer.com/imagefeed/featured/microsoft2013/projectspark/livestream610/projectspark610asset06.jpg" alt="" /><br /></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size:12px;">To start, the game&#39;s creative director and community manager show off the blank canvas of the empty world mode.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size:12px;">In this mode, you are able to create an entirely interactive world of your own. In the picture shown above, you can see the world map and the starting playable character chosen for the demonstration.</span></p>
<p><img style="max-width:610px;" border="0" src="http://media1.gameinformer.com/imagefeed/featured/microsoft2013/projectspark/livestream610/projectspark610asset31.jpg" alt="" /></p>
<p><span style="font-size:12px;">In order to show off the ease of use with a touch screen, the demo is shown using a PC running Windows 8. In this case, a U-shaped landmass is easy to construct because of the intuitiveness of touch screen controls. The demo, however, is shown using a Xbox 360 controller. The silvery mass is created and guided by the orange circular cursor on screen.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size:12px;"><img style="max-width:610px;" border="0" src="http://media1.gameinformer.com/imagefeed/featured/microsoft2013/projectspark/livestream610/projectspark610asset30.jpg" alt="" /><br /></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size:12px;">To add more depth to the world, players can construct land masses by expanding or lowering land. This latter option combined with tinkering with water levels is how water masses can be created. In the image above, a massive tree stump is created by expanding land mass upwards and hollowing out the center of the mass. Afterwards, texture is added to the stump to make it look more realistic.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size:12px;"><img style="max-width:610px;" border="0" src="http://media1.gameinformer.com/imagefeed/featured/microsoft2013/projectspark/livestream610/projectspark610asset03.jpg" alt="" /><br /></span></p>
<p>To really bring the world alive, various &quot;biomes&quot; options can be used. A biome is basically a type of environment&mdash; like an &quot;arctic&quot; setting or &quot;woodlands&quot; setting&nbsp;&mdash; that can be spread onto the surfaces of the map. This includes grass, snow, plants, sand dunes, etc.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:12px;">The various biomes make the level more noticeably realistic. &nbsp;Above, a river biome is spread out upon a water mass to give it a more natural appearance.&nbsp;</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size:12px;"><img style="max-width:610px;" border="0" src="http://media1.gameinformer.com/imagefeed/featured/microsoft2013/projectspark/livestreamimages/zwrapping.jpg" alt="" /><br /></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size:12px;">Players can add even more detail by creating tunnels and waterfalls. The wrapping option can be used to add textures quickly and easily to even these types of surfaces on the map.&nbsp;</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size:12px;">In between creating, the user can switch right into test mode and see how the environment will look when playing. Just as easily, the user can switch back to designing if it doesn&#39;t look quite right.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size:12px;">What makes the level creation easy is that objects like characters and props are pre-loaded with &quot;brains.&quot; The brain basically consists of actions that these objects perform. The brains can be set to perform desired new actions by the player.</span></p>
<p>For example, in the demonstration, a rock is set to follow the player&#39;s character.</p>
<p><img style="max-width:610px;" border="0" src="http://media1.gameinformer.com/imagefeed/featured/microsoft2013/projectspark/livestream610/projectspark610asset25.jpg" alt="" /></p>
<p>Just the same, the object can be set instead to attack the player, or even emote certain ways when the player passes by. The method of attack can be anything from a bow and arrows to a missile&mdash; and even the size of the projectiles can be modified.</p>
<p><img style="max-width:610px;" border="0" src="http://media1.gameinformer.com/imagefeed/featured/microsoft2013/projectspark/livestream610/projectspark610asset19.jpg" alt="" /></p>
<p>Another example is shown with a set of goblins (which would ordinarily attack the player) instead fall in love with and/or dance near the player.&nbsp;</p>
<p><strong>Check out more ways to customize levels and see a preview of a developer designed level using Project Spark on page two.</strong></p>
<p></p></div></div><script type="text/javascript">PaginateGrid();</script><img src="https://www.gameinformer.com/aggbug.aspx?PostID=3805160" width="1" height="1">team dakotalive demolive streamproject sparkPreviewActionmicrosoft studiosXbox One